Abstract

Since 1979, the Chinese economy has undergone an unprecedented transformation from a command model to a socialist market system. How companies are governed and regulated, and how investors are protected in China’s vibrant economy is a concern of legal practitioners and scholars worldwide. China’s 2013 revision of the Company Law has sparked new attention in this more than 35-year-old debate. In his 2015 publication, “Corporate Law in China. Structure, Governance and Regulation”, author, SHEN Wei, Professor of Law at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, aims to provide an understanding of the dynamics that inform the current legal landscape of different corporate actors in China. The book’s ultimate goal is to give a full account of various types of Chinese corporations and their distinctive characteristics. As the title indicates, his approach seeks to frame legal questions within a broader regulatory context. This is an ambitious endeavor, and one that necessarily crosses into multiple facets of law, history, politics and socio-economics.